Mr. Galloway is Professor of Marketing at the New York University Stern School of Business and the co-host of the Pivot Podcast with Kara Swisher covering the tech economy.
So, I got into a fight with my… or not fight… (I think conflict and debate are part of progress) … with my producer over at Pivot. [She] keeps editing some of my more profane or salty or edge or comments, and it really pisses me off and we’ve gone back and forth.
And she is just doing her job and doing her level best to protect the enterprise and probably protect me.
Um, and there’s a method to the madness and there’s, I think, ahhh, I think you want to be thoughtful around how provocative or how, I don’t know what’s the term. I think it’s provocative.
I’m a vulgar and profane person and it’s not an act. And if you listen to this show, you know, that it’s authentic. This is how I think. I curse a lot. And make a lot of off color comments and a lot of people come to me and say well, I love how provocative you are and I’m trying to think about how to incorporate that into my professional life. And my advice to you is don’t.
So this comes from a place… or this tone of being aggressive and profane and vulgar… sometimes it comes from a place that is more strategic than you might think. And that is, I consider myself a progressive on almost every social value political value, economic value. I am, you know, I sound center left, but the reality is [I’m] probably pretty far left.
And something that I think has weakened progressive policies, our ability to get anything done, is that we have become so sensitive. We have become so easily offended. Uh, we have become so focused on how we divide each other, by making a cartoon of each other’s comments.
And then making assertions and getting into this game of “guardians of gotcha” and trying to get virtue points. To be offended in our nation is to be right. And it’s total bullshit. Being offended is your emotion.
Productive conversations are This is why i think you’re wrong or this is my view and how it contrasts with yours. That’s a productive conversation. And the left is spending so much time trying to find virtue points by calling out each other that it makes a cartoon of the important work we need to get done around systemic racism, around income inequality, around women’s rights. And it ends up hurting us because we’re seen as people who are worse than anything because we’re just fucking humorless.
And also, we’ve incorrectly conflated vulgarity and profanity with being a sexist or a bigot. And the two have absolutely nothing to do with each other.
If you look back in history, The real liberals in media were comedians. Lenny Bruce, Richard Pryor, George Carlin. And they were the most profane comedians. And part of the power of communicating ideas is humor. And I see, with the modest platform I have, and I generally believe this.
I want to take profanity or help take profanity and vulgarity back for progressives. And it’s okay. And one of the things i value so much about my relationship with Kara [Swisher] on the Pivot podcasts, is, I say, you know, inappropriate or edgy jokes about my sexuality about her sexuality about how hot someone is or what have you? And there’ll be a pause, an uncomfortable moment, and then she laughs and it gives everyone else permission after realizing that part of accepting each other is recognizing and ribbing each other for our differences.
It should never be mean spirited. They should never diminish anybody. And if someone would ever say to me or comments make me feel diminished, I will stop.
But humor, vulgarity, profanity have been incorrectly conflated with weird, conservative far, right discriminatory behavior. And that just could not be further from the truth.
Having said that having said that I’m in a position to do this. Because while I can be canceled, you know I can’t [because] I have economic security. I have a certain number of people in my life. I’m on the back nine of my professional career.
And I realize when I say these things, there’s a non-zero probability someone Is going to go crazy with it and whatever the mood is or the ground underneath us at that time where result is, you know, a quick and severe end to this podcast or what have you. And I care, but it’s not profound for me.
And if you are economically secure and have people in your life and they love you, you have an obligation to speak your mind and say things that you think are true.
If you are not, be careful. And that is, your job in a corporation, your job in a large organization, is to be mindful, and thoughtful, and err on the side of grace. And it scares me because I hear from a lot of people, specifically young men, who say they want to be more aggressive and provocative in their comments and my attitude is don’t because occasionally, i get it wrong and I say stupid things.
But let me finish where i started. Vulgarity and profanity are vulgarity and profanity. They do not have anything to do with your political views…
…Anyways, a bit of a riff, a bit of a riff. But recognize that when your friends are profane and vulgar, if you don’t like profanity and vulgarity, that’s one thing. But don’t assume it has anything to do with their political views or the way they treat other people.